Frolicking with Dinosaurs

I recently finished Carol Shields' first novel, Small Ceremonies.

It's a little gem of a book. A great, tightly woven story.

At the heart of the book is Judith Gill, a noted biographer, who is desperate to write fiction. In her failed attempt at creativity, she plagiarizes an idea.

Later, feeling remorse, she opts not to use it...only to discover that the only person who read her work in draft form -- a successful author (Furlong Eberhardt) suffering from writer's block -- has ripped off the idea that she's stolen.

Judith is incredibly affronted by the theft of her second-hand idea. So much so that she turns her analytical biographer's eye on the successful author, attempting to turn up some bit of dirt with which to publically humiliate him.

Now this is where the novel feels rooted in another era, even though it was only published in 1995.

Where does Judith go to dig up dirt on Furlong? The library.

That's right. It's 1995 PG. Pre-Google.

It struck me, as I was reading, how long it has been since I've actually sifted through real books to find information.

When I need information for my job -- oh, about 300 times a day -- I just open my browser and go.

I can find pretty much everything I need in a couple of clicks.

Back when I was working on my thesis and sifting through the uncollected short stories of JD Salinger, I knew the librarians by their first names.

We had to send away for the stories I needed. It often took weeks -- particularly since Salinger tried to block me from receiving them. (Claim to fame.)

They'd arrive either on micofiche or still in the magazine in which they were printed, and I'd pore over them while sitting at a desk in the library.

It really was another era.

There's a lyric in Jim Stafford's country classic, "I don't like spiders and snakes." It goes:

I think of that girl from time to time,
I call her up when I got a dime.

After hearing the song, my friend Catherine said, "You know, there's a whole generation of people alive today who've never experienced the ten cent phone call."

Yup. Cause they all have cell phones.